


Lucrezia's Doll

by grumblebee



Category: Original Work
Genre: Body Horror, Corpse Desecration, Gore, Horror, Medical Experimentation, Murder, Mutilation, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-19
Updated: 2019-04-19
Packaged: 2020-01-16 06:41:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18515989
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grumblebee/pseuds/grumblebee
Summary: A research student details the life and crimes of Dr. Filippo Lucrezia, a surgeon from WWI whose horrific experiments are under examination at Sacramento State University nearly 100 years later.





	Lucrezia's Doll

My name is Andrew Cole, and I’m a research student at Sacramento State. If you’re reading this, then you already know a little bit about the topic. This isn’t really my area of expertise, but I think I’ve gathered enough information to know what Lucrezia’s Doll is, and why Sacramento State should cease funding its research. 

Lucrezia’s Doll is a criminal case study from the early 20th century involving one Italian Dr. Filippo Lucrezia. Lucrezia was a mild mannered man; well liked by his friends and colleagues. He worked as a surgeon outside Milan, and for the most part lived a well-to-do life. When WWI broke out he enlisted as a medic and served in the Italian armed forces. That’s where researchers believe his fixation started. 

As a medic Lucrezia was exposed to the worst of the war. Countless diary entries detail the deployment of young men, healthy and able, only to return in pieces. Some of these pieces were still alive, and were sent to Lucrezia for fixing. He wrote, “I pray everyday for a morning where I do not look a disfigured man in the eye, and an evening where I do not shut my eyes to find the dead seared behind them.” 

It’s hard to discern from the diaries exactly when Lucrezia became obsessed with partialism, but just that it manifested around the last year of the war. Partialism, for those who don’t know, is a sexual fixation on a body part that is not the genitals. You may know a very popular type of partialism: foot fetishes. Lucrezia wasn’t a foot fetishist, in fact some researchers refuse to label Lucrezia’s actions as driven by partialism because he didn’t perform sexual acts with non-sexual body parts. But what happened next was close to it.

One of the last entries of Lucrezia’s diary chronicles his obsession with a man’s right arm after he was brought in from the field. It was mangled by a rogue piece of shrapnel, barely hanging on by skin and bone right at the socket by the shoulder. Lucrezia was  _ fascinated _ by this man, who unfortunately bled out before the wound could be clamped. A line from the medical report, written and signed off by Lucrezia, read “By chance, the jagged metal flew with such ferocity that it severed the arm at the shoulder, leaving only a flap of skin around exposed bone. One or two passes with the saw and the arm would fall away clean.” He went on to detail the arm, marveling on its form even when detached from the body. Smooth, still, sculpturesque. I’ve found a second medical report on the same soldier, this one without Lucrezia’s obvious interest. I’ve concluded that this first one was written, looked over, and tucked away by Lucrezia for the next phase of his obsession.

What we know of Lucrezia’s first steps into madness is very little. His journal pages were torn out from April 1918 to February 1919, and did not resume again until he was back in civilian life. Military records are slim. Most were lost decades later during WWII. But with a little digging I’ve pieced together the last few months of Lucrezia’s military life.

Firstly, patients were still being brought in by the dozens. I know this because of the countless boxes of records, all bearing Lucrezia’s signature. The discrepancies started out slow, with only minor mistakes on record. In the case of a soldier Giuseppe Rossi, Lucrezia had operated on him for a total of two hours, trying desperately to repair abdominal damage before ultimately losing him. The body was boxed and sent to the grieving family, along with a report of the damage done to the body so that they could decide whether or not to open the casket. Upon opening the casket, the widow Mrs. Rossi was distraught to find that two of her husband’s fingers were missing—the ring and pinky fingers of his left hand. This was not detailed on the report. Letters were sent, and the Rossi family received a response from Lucrezia on June 8th 1918, apologizing for forgetting to include the fingers on the report. His explanation was that he was a busy and important doctor, and that the body count was extremely high. The Rossi family did not return a response. 

The second discrepancy happened only three weeks later, when the family of Emilio Desi was preparing the dead soldier for his burial. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary until the family was redressing the corpse in its funeral suit. While Emilio’s body was turned, so as to put on his suit jacket, his brother Antoni heard something fall to the floor and skitter. Looking over the shoulder of his dead brother, Antoni saw what the objects were: two small stones. Stones the size of a marble. It was then that Antoni’s mother began to shriek, looking at the body of her son, and Antoni turned to stare into two lifeless empty pits. Emilio’s eyes were missing. 

Once again letters were sent, this time with more anger. Lucrezia wrote and apologized for the mistake, and mentioned that he must have mixed up Desi’s medical report with that of another patient. An excerpt from his first letter read, “Young brave Emilio was brought into my tent after being exposed to gas. His eyes were heavily damaged and would have to be removed to prevent infection. He expired during the surgery due to scarring of the lungs. The stones were placed to fill out the shape of the eyes for his burial, if only to bring your family mild comfort. They truly were a lovely shade of blue.” 

The Desi family did respond, mostly grief ridden and angry at the surgeon for mixing up the records. They sent other letters as well to the armed forces complaining of Lucrezia’s mistake, but to no avail. From letters between Lucrezia and his commanding officers we know he was sternly warned not to slip up anymore, but that his services were still greatly needed. 

Perhaps it was this great need that allowed Lucrezia’s obsession to remained unchecked, as the number of his “mistakes” increased as his final weeks in the military chugged on. At the height of his obsession 1 in 10 deceased soldiers were mutilated before being sent home. This is a rough estimate because those are only the ones we know about. The ones he was caught doing. Some estimate that it could have been double, triple, even more than half of all his deceased patients. But, like I said, this isn’t my area of expertise.

On October 3rd, 1918, however, Lucrezia was suddenly discharged from the military. There is a brief mention of it, though not in any official record. The official military records have long since been destroyed. This mention was written in the diary of a superior officer who visited the camp where Lucrezia operated. He stated, “This war has turned us from God, and I will kiss the feet of the next priest who forgives me for all the sins I have witnessed.” He then goes to mention that the doctor had been mutilating bodies, but he did not have the stomach to go into detail. Lucrezia was sent back to Milan. The war would end roughly a month later. 

Lucrezia, like many soldiers, did not adjust back to civilian life following the war. He picked up his old practice, but soon encountered complications. The hospital where he worked received numerous complaints, mostly concerning Lucrezia’s bedside manner when treating former soldiers. His mood would swing wildly, often back and forth between anger and adoration. One former soldier came to Lucrezia in need of new prosthetics, as his face was heavily disfigured. The soldier later recounted that Lucrezia insisted that he didn’t need new prosthetics, but surgery, and tried to bully him into a vaguely described operation that would “right his jaw.” When the soldier declined Lucrezia flew into a rage, and the man ran from the room. He did not speak of this incident until Lucrezia’s eventual arrest. Even then, he only said that Lucrezia was insistent on performing surgery, and that before his outburst Lucrezia repeatedly stroked his jaw longingly. 

When the diary starts again Lucrezia was no longer working at the hospital. The rules were stricter, and he was too close to civilian life to perform whatever horrendous acts he did while in the field. Instead, he opened a small surgeon shop in his home. It took up the first floor, and was routinely busy. It was then that the second round of experiments began; the ones that ultimately led to his arrest.

On March 20th, 1919 a woman named Maria d'Ambrosio visited Lucrezia with signs of abdominal distress. After a quick checkup she was diagnosed with appendicitis, and was brought to the operating room within Lucrezia’s home for emergency surgery. Ms. D’Ambrosio was then sent home and told to stay on bed rest. Her health got progressively worse over the week, and within ten days of the surgery she passed away. The D’Ambrosio family called another doctor during her final hours, who noticed something odd about the bruising that was appearing on the right hand side of her body. After her death, the doctor performed an autopsy to see if all of the appendix had been removed successfully. It had, along with two feet of her large intestine and her gallbladder. 

Just as he did in the army, Lucrezia explained that the appendix had burst, and that he needed to remove damaged organs. It was met with anger and disbelief. The D’Ambrosio family would be the first to testify.    


The second patient suffer similar consequences was Hector Francese, the local grocer. He was half crushed unloading crates from a cart, and taken to Lucrezia’s clinic as it was the closest medical center. The initial injury broke three of his ribs, but his death was caused by the crude removal of a lung. 

And then there were the vagrants. People began to notice the absence of the destitute on the streets surrounding Lucrezia’s home. At first it was overlooked, as Lucrezia was a doctor and lived in a relatively nice part of Milan. But soon suspicions grew, and people began to notice odd things happening around the doctor’s home and office. Lucrezia was seen taking long walks at night, usually stopping by the occasional better and handing them some food. At first these gestures were done towards those who were homeless soldiers, to which onlookers saw as an act of pity or solidarity. But soon those men began to vanish. Victor Francese, cousin of the deceased Hector, later testified he saw Lucrezia approach a homeless soldier who walked with a cane due to his mangled leg. He saw Lucrezia hand the man an apple and some bread, and offer to take a look at it in his office free of charge. The homeless man did not go with him immediately, but within a day or two he stopped begging outside Francese’s store. He stopped coming around at all. 

More witnesses came forward, reporting to the police that they had seen Lucrezia accosting homeless men far from his home, sometimes ending with angry outbursts. These reports were overlooked, as local police believed that it was the homeless accosting the doctor, and not the other way around. 

The last straw came when an 11-year-old boy came running into the police station screaming bloody murder. The boy, a newsie for  _ Corriere della Sera _ , was riding his bike past Lucrezia’s home before dawn on his way to pick up his stack of papers. In the faint early morning light the boy said he saw the doctor carrying dirty bundles of sheets, which he threw into the dumpster at the side of his home. The boy admitted to dumpster diving, saying that he planned on taking the sheets back to his mother to be washed, and possibly resold. The boy then stated that he stood on his bike and grabbed ahold of one of the sheets, noting it was dark and sticky. As he pulled it something came tumbling from within—a human head. The boy toppled from his bike and ran straight to the police, his hands still coated with blood.

Upon seeing this the police dispatched immediately for Lucrezia’s home to confirm the claim. They found the dumpster and the overturned bike, just where the boy had left it. Inside the dumpster was the severed head, it’s graying mouth agape. The tongue had been cut out, and it looked as though the neck had also been opened to remove the vocal cords. As the sun rose, the police set out to arrest Filippo Lucrezia. 

The front door to his home was kicked down, and as people filtered into the streets to look on the police entered the Lucrezia home. The first floor, his medical practice, was empty. An officer searched the second floor, which was also empty. The bed was made and it looked as though no one had slept there the previous night. It looked like Lucrezia had fled.

However, the newsie stated that Lucrezia had entered the home again through a side door, and upon investigation the police found that the closet by the first floor side entrance had a false back. When removed, the police could see an old set of stairs leading down to a basement door. They moved quietly. Before they reached the door moaning could be heard inside, low and weary. The door was broken down and the world saw what Lucrezia had been working on.

Two figures were in that basement. The first was Lucrezia, hunched over his work—scribbling away. He didn’t move at the sound of the door, or flinch as the police waved their torches around the basement to get a full look at his crime—which was seated in the chair beside him.

It was a man, or what was left of one. Armless and legless, the man was propped up on the chair and strapped in with thick leather bonds. His skin was pale, almost translucent. The police were in shock, disbelieving that the doctor had been cobbling together bits of dead men to create one stinking corpse. That was until one of the policemen shone the light at the disfigured man’s face, and watched his cloudy eyes snap to attention. It  _ screamed. _ Blood ran down its pale chin, and even in the low light the stitches around the tongue and neck were visible. It was screaming with stolen parts.

The man-thing was shot, mercifully, if not from downright fear. Lucrezia was dragged into the street and taken in. News soon spread of the doctor who tried to create a living corpse in his home, and Milan was outraged by the creation of  _ Lucrezia’s Doll.  _ On July 19th, 1920, Dr. Filippo Lucrezia was executed for his crimes.

In the almost 100 years since this case, Lucrezia’s atrocities have resurfaced more than once. Not long after Italy joined the axis powers in WWII, the writings of Lucrezia were circulated among other sick individuals within the Nazi party. Their crimes, along with the details of Lucrezia’s, were burned shortly before the end of the war. Lucrezia’s work was also cited within two cases of cannibalism and necrophilia in the United States between 1970-1985. The case attracts the sick and curious, and gives those with the means for violence the opportunity to do so. You see, Lucrezia’s Doll was not just a criminal case study, but a medical one as well. 

Without the know-how of blood type or organ rejection, Lucrezia pieced together a faux-human being using stolen, but otherwise viable, human parts. It is unfairly compared to Shelley’s  _ Frankenstein _ , often solely on the idea of cobbling together one man from many. Unlike  _ Frankenstein,  _ Lucrezia’s Doll did not push the medical field through reanimating, but simple transplantation. Piece by piece, Lucrezia fused living tissue until he created a whole new creature. We just don’t know  _ exactly  _ how he did it.

I’m posting this here, as well as submitting a signed copy to the board of Sacramento State University, to urge for the end of research of Lucrezia’s Doll. In fall 2018 I was accepted into the university, and given the opportunity to shadow under Dr. Michael Rhodes. Dr.Rhodes is the assistant chair to the department, and he specializes in organ transplantation. He assigned me Lucrezia’s Doll for a book he was writing, stating that he would need a full history of Lucrezia, along with any documents I might find. I sent them over periodically while working on my own coursework. By the winter term of 2018-2019 I noticed a severe change in Dr. Rhodes. He was angrier, more irrational. I would email my findings only to receive angry voicemails that it was not enough. 

His mood would swing wildly, and sometimes he would calm down and apologize. He blamed long work hours. Meanwhile, in my normal classes, word was getting around that someone was stealing the lab animals. Suspicions landed on the animal rights group that was active on campus. But I believed something more was going on. One morning I was headed to the lab to get a head start on a project when I saw one of the lab rats laying on the floor beside the cage. The cage door was locked, and all the rats we had the night before were safe inside. The loose rat lay on its side, legs twitching awkwardly. As I got a closer look I could see that it was the same type of rat we use in our experiments. Multiple of them. The rat was sewn together in a crisscross of stitches. I’m ashamed to say that I put the poor thing down and threw it in the trash. 

I ignored the rat incident as best I could, but I started noticing the pattern everywhere I went. In the spring the feral cats around campus went missing. The biology lab reported the absence of five frogs and seven more rats. A report went out on the news alerting people to keep their dogs inside, due to snatchings. All the while I would receive email after email from Dr.Rhodes looking for more research, all of which I sent him. 

I’m writing all of this out now because of the most recent email I received from Dr. Rhodes. It was sent at 2:46 am, waiting for me to open as I woke up. The subject read “Excellent Work.” Below, Dr.Rhodes wrote:

“Dear Andrew,

Thank you so much for your patience and diligence these past few months. Your research into Dr. Lucrezia has been a blessing. I am proud to say that my project is now in its final stages, and I am ready to move on to the next phase. But it cannot move on without you. Please see me, and we can discuss the next leap into this revolutionary field.”

At the bottom of the email he listed an address. It did not belong to the campus. I put it into google maps, perhaps hoping it was a restaurant or café. Instead came the image of a quiet residential street, and with a little snooping I found that it was Dr.Rhodes’ home. The home was quaint, and in a nice part of town, but it felt off. I zoomed out, looking over the streets, only to realize I was already familiar with the area. His house was right in the center of the neighborhood with all the missing dogs. I closed the email and began to draft this post.

Upon posting this I will be withdrawing immediately from Sacramento State and moving back home. I won’t be meeting with Dr.Rhodes before I do, nor do I suggest anyone meet with him off campus or after hours. His work  _ can _ continue without me, he just needs a body for the next phase. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! If you like what you see, please leave a comment and make my day :D


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